This Salmon Blog has been at it for one year, actually one year and a day or something like that. I'm not that nostalgic and one year isn't that great a feat for a blog or any writing endeavor for that matter. And no, I didn't write every day or every week in the first year and I do not plan to make any extra effort to do so in year two. I could write about all the minutia pertaining to salmon on a daily basis, but the minutia isn't what this is about. This is about saving the wild salmon and steelhead of the Snake River Basin or more correctly about us breaching four lower Snake River dams so that the wild salmon and wild steelhead can save themselves. Their survival shouldn't be about us, but we have to breach those dams in order for the fish to save themselves, perhaps this knowledge and man's hubris or man's ego means we will keep the dams as a crutch so that we can say we saved the salmon though in keeping the dams we will not do anything but secure their ultimate demise.

Enough about this blog...I have noticed a severe increase in the stories about how climate change is dooming salmon. It's like a bunch of people received some talking points and they are releasing story after story about how climate change is dooming our salmon. There was a story about salmon getting pinched between warm water and low water due to climate change, there have been others basically saying our salmon are doomed due to the effects of climate change. I must find out who is sending out these talking points because from a fatalistic approach or from a logical approach such stories say to those who control things like lower Snake River dams that there is no need to breach the dams because the salmon are truly damned.

I am not a climate change denier or whatever it is they are being called these days, but I am a climate change realist. And by that I mean I am not one who is floored by the idea that the climate is changing. Yes, this was once Snowball Earth and this was once a very hot and steamy planet and it has been everything in between and will continue to be so. Yes, I do believe that our emissions have had some direct effect in climate change, but I do not pretend to know how much, nor do I pretend to know what, if any, changes we can make would reverse this change. Also, on the idea of reversing climate change, I place that squarely in the ballpark of the hubris of man. I seriously do not believe we have the wherewithal to control the climate especially any intentional control. I will admit that there has been great success in cloud seeding and I'm still waiting for the opportunity to post my comments at a public hearing on that. Anyway, these stories that say our salmon are damned due to climate change completely fly in the face of efforts to save salmon now.

Yes, transition to better forms of energy as soon as possible, but don't expect the climate to just magically snap back into some perfect place because it is constantly changing and we have had an effect, but so have volcanoes and the sun. We also have ever changing flora and the land is in constant flux either naturally or by the hand of man and this too plays a role in the climate changing as areas move from carbon banks to carbon release. The short of this message is, you don't strengthen your argument to save the wild salmon and steelhead now by breaching the dams by saying in your next breath, by the way, climate change will kill them off in a few years anyway.

I doubt anyone understood what I just said. It comes from a real place and not some fantasy that has man rushing to the aid of whatever ails and fixes it at the 11th hour right before the reaper shows up. Lose the hubris, think before you jump off the cliff of the cause and remember the only way you are going to allow wild salmon and steelhead of the Snake basin to recover themselves is by breaching those four lower Snake River dams and those dams don't get breached if your argument is breach the dams but in a few decades they'll be gone anyway.

Well, I'm sure I just made a lot of people mad, well, we can affect the change that will lead to the wild salmon and steelhead of the Snake River Basin recovering themselves, but not if we tell everyone that this other bogeyman will kill them off about as soon as we can get an agreement to breach some dams.

And another note, we really aren't any closer to breaching the dams than we were when this blog started. There has been no real change in the House of Representatives and thus that means the eastern Washington dam lover is still in charge of the committee that would approve or disapprove of any bill to breach those dams and that means any bill would fail. Solutions Table has many who support the idea, but apparently no one hired a planner or a caterer for that matter and that will continue to lag until someone with some organizing skills forces people to the table. And even then, don't expect magic to happen, if you don't get those dams breached in any agreement then your time was wasted and the salmon's time is that much shorter. Otherwise, have a great November.

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A blog should elicit a healthy dialogue

Thank you for coming to my blog about restoring wild salmon and steelhead in the Snake River Basin. At times, I may write something that is either controversial or something you do not agree with (this being America and all). I welcome your comments. An engaging dialogue is healthy. However, before commenting, I do want you to remember that you sought this blog out. This blog did not come and get you and force you to read anything posted here. So in no way has this blog victimized you. That is only in your head. Knowing that, understand that I welcome your comments, but you are also in my house and as such a guest. Please conduct yourself in that manner. I will not tolerate insults, nor do I care to read about some new product you want to guerrilla market on my site. For those marketers out there who ask once every three weeks for me to blog about your products, this is not a business site. As this blog currently stands (not a business), I will not be writing any blogs about whatever exciting new product I have never heard of that you want plugged on my site. I pay a certain amount of money for this space on the internet and I share my thoughts, which I hope you enjoy and find thought provoking. Thank you again for reading, I really do hope something you read here is thought provoking. I also hope that you will join me in the hope that this will be the generation that saves wild salmon and steelhead in the Snake River Basin rather than the generation that watched as they passed into history.

Author

Michael Wells is an award winning journalist and photographer living in Idaho. He moved out west to insert himself in the salmon narrative, yeah, well the scenery is prettier than back east, too. He never had designs on writing about salmon for the rest of his life, so breach some dams already so he can get on with his life. He is a member of Trout Unlimited, Idaho Rivers United, Idaho Conservation League, Friends of the Clearwater, and Wilderness Watch. This blog also shares information from Friends of the Clearwater, Save Our Salmon and the Western Watersheds Project when the work they are doing coincides with the overall goal of this blog, which is to simply have mankind get out of the way enough for wild salmon and steelhead of the Snake River Basin to recover to the point of such an abundance that we no longer revere them. He can be reached at salmonblog AT yahoo DOT com.